Why should interaction designers read critical theory? Critical theory is proving unexpectedly relevant to media and technology studies. The editors of this volume argue that reading critical theory - understood in the broadest sense, including but not limited to the Frankfurt School - can help designers do what they want to do; can teach wisdom itself; can provoke; and can introduce new ways of seeing. They illustrate their argument by presenting classic texts by thinkers in critical theory from Althusser to æZiæzek alongside essays in which leaders in interaction design and HCI describe the influence of the text on their work. For example, one contributor considers the relevance of Umberto Eco's "Openness, Information, Communication" to digital content; another reads Walter Benjamin's "The Author as Producer" in terms of interface designers; and another reflects on the implications of Judith Butler's Gender Trouble for interaction design. The editors offer a substantive introduction that traces the various strands of critical theory. Taken together, the essays show how critical theory and interaction design can inform each other, and how interaction design, drawing on critical theory, might contribute to our deepest needs for connection, competency, self-esteem, and well-being. -- From dust jacket.

Fretting in the shadow of language: interpretation and evaluation /Mark Blythe -- The seven veils of fantasy (1997) / Slavoj éZiézek -- Wild theory, or--did somebody say éZiézek? / Mark Blythe -- Rotation of crops: a venture in a theory of social prudence (1843) / S²ren Kierkegaard, edited and translated by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong -- Against boredom: the demonic pantheism in design / Olav W. Bertelsen -- Myth today (1957) / Roland Barthes, translated by Annette Lavers -- Barthes, and calling the mundane to account / Jofish Kaye -- The open work (1989) / Umberto Eco, translated by Anna Cancogni -- What does digital content mean? Umberto Eco and the open work / Alan F. Blackwell -- Encoding/decoding (1978) / Stuart Hall -- Stuart Hall: cultural studies, human-computer interaction, and encoding/decoding / Elizabeth F. Churchill -- Grasping a text (1978) / Wolfgang Iser -- Wolfgang Iser and the reader as creator / Melanie Feinberg -- The intellectual virtues / Aristotle, translated by F.H. Peters -- Way back to some design futures: Aristotle's intellectual excellences and their implications for designing / Gilbert Cockton -- Pugnacious aesthetes and barely closeted moralists / Jeffrey Bardzell -- The author as producer (1934) / Walter Benjamin, translated by Edmund Jephcott -- The (cultural) interface designer as producer / S²ren Bro Pold -- The new forms of control (1964) / Herbert Marcuse -- Herbert Marcuse and the "one-dimensional man" / Erik Stolterman -- Ideology and ideological state apparatuses (notes towards an investigation) (1970) / Louis Althusser, translated by Ben Brewster -- Ideology and interpellation: Althusser's "Ideology and ideological state apparatuses" / Paul Dorish -- Gender trouble (1999) / Judith Butler -- Performing interaction design with Judith Butler / Ann Light -- Why has critique run out of steam? From matters of fact to matters of concern (2004) / Bruno Latour -- Bruno Latour as sociologist and design theorist? / Carl DiSalvo -- The politics of amnesia (2003) / Terry Eagleton -- After critical design / Mark Blythe -- The artworld (1964) / Arthur C. Danto -- Danto's artworld: art--and design--as inquiry / Jeffrey Bardzell -- Lucidly bewildered: participatory and political design / Shaowen Bardzell -- From notes made in 1970-1971 / Mikhail M. Bakhtin, translated by Vern W. McGee -- Bakhtin's dialogics and the "human" in human-centered design / Peter Wright and John McCarthy -- Non-theatrical performance (1993) / Allan Kaprow -- Kaprow and HCI: reflections on "participation" in research through design / Kirsten Boehner -- Panopticism (1975) / Michel Foucault, translated by Alan Sheridan -- Michel Foucaluth on the panopticon: a commentary / John Bowers -- Nature and space (1998) / James C. Scott -- Seeing like Seeing like a state / Hrönn Brynjarsdóttir Holmer, Phoebe Sengers, and Kaiton Williams -- Knowing the Oriental (1978) / Edward W. Said -- Representing others: HCI and postcolonialism / Bekiu Grinter -- The generalized and the concrete other (1992) / Seyla Benhabib -- Through the "cracks and fissures" in the smart home to ubiquitous utopia / Shaowen Bardzell. I. Fretting in the shadow of language: interpretation and evaluation / Mark Blythe : The seven veils of fantasy (1997) / Slavoj Žižek -- Wild theory, or, did somebody say Žižek? / Mark Blythe -- Rotation of crops: a venture in a theory of social prudence (1843) / Søren Kierkegaard, edited and translated by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong -- Against boredom: the demonic pantheism in design / Olav W. Bertelsen -- Myth today (1957) / Roland Barthes, translated by Annette Lavers -- Barthes, and calling the mundane to account / Jofish Kaye -- The open work (1989) / Umberto Eco, translated by Anna Cancogni -- What does digital content mean?: Umberto Eco and The open work / Alan F. Blackwell -- Encoding/decoding (1978) / Stuart Hall -- Stuart Hall: cultural studies, human-computer interaction, and encoding/decoding / Elizabeth F. Churchill -- Grasping a text (1978) / Wolfgang Iser -- Wolfgang Iser and the reader as creator / Melanie Feinberg -- The intellectual virtues / Aristotle, translated by F.H. Peters -- Way back to some design futures: Aristotle's intellectual excellences and their implications for designing / Gilbert Cockton -- II. Pugnacious aesthetes and barely closeted moralists / Jeffrey Bardzell -- The author as producer (1934) / Walter Benjamin, translated by Edmund Jephcott -- The (cultural) interface designer as producer / Søren Bro Pold -- The new forms of control (1964) / Herbert Marcuse -- Herbert Marcuse and the "one-dimensional man" / Erik Stolterman -- Ideology and ideological state apparatuses (notes towards an investigation) (1970) / Louis Althusser, translated by Ben Brewster -- Ideology and interpellation: Althusser's "Ideology and ideological state apparatuses" / Paul Dorish -- Gender trouble (1999) / Judith Butler -- Performing interaction design with Judith Butler / Ann Light -- Why has critique run out of steam?: From matters of fact to matters of concern (2004) / Bruno Latour -- Bruno Latour as sociologist and design theorist? / Carl DiSalvo -- The politics of amnesia (2003) / Terry Eagleton -- After critical design / Mark Blythe -- The artworld (1964) / Arthur C. Danto -- Danto's artworld: art, and design, as inquiry / Jeffrey Bardzell -- III. Lucidly bewildered: participatory and political design / Shaowen Bardzell -- From notes made in 1970-1971 / Mikhail M. Bakhtin, translated by Vern W. McGee -- Bakhtin's dialogics and the "human" in human-centered design / Peter Wright and John McCarthy -- Non-theatrical performance (1993) / Allan Kaprow -- Kaprow and HCI: reflections on "participation" in research through design / Kirsten Boehner -- Panopticism (1975) / Michel Foucault, translated by Alan Sheridan -- Michel Foucault on the panopticon: a commentary / John Bowers -- Nature and space (1998) / James C. Scott -- Seeing like Seeing like a state / Hrönn Brynjarsdóttir Holmer, Phoebe Sengers, and Kaiton Williams -- Knowing the Oriental (1978) / Edward W. Said -- Representing others: HCI and postcolonialism / Beki Grinter -- The generalized and the concrete other (1992) / Seyla Benhabib -- Through the "cracks and fissures" in the smart home to ubiquitous utopia / Shaowen Bardzell.